2 unexpected stops.
1 oil change.
12 Adele songs...on repeat.
351 photographs.
4 friends.
4 family.
Geographically speaking, the road home is self-explanatory. Common sense tells me that South is the general direction to get me where I need to go. Then bank left somewhere outside Georgia and casually coast into my Carolina state of mind. Calculate in the traffic in various cities at particular hours of the day and you have the potential for road rage, but that comes with the territory. I have come to flat out worship my navigational app on my cell phone. It is the sole reason I was able to turn down any enticing road in any given state and still find my way with little difficulty, back to the highways. I am s
till thankful I was taught how to read a map and ask for directions. While driving through the back roads, nearly teetering off the edge of a mountain, reception is shall we say..."if-y". ( sorry Mom.)
However, common sense also tells you something else....despite your valiant efforts to remai
n unchanged and "the same" as you were; to resist, life has other plans. And there is no telling what the pathways of the heart will do to the journey home. You don't know what is packed inside the suitcase of the heart. The most abrupt and sometimes shocking discovery of your "baggage" so to speak is to spend an incredible amount of time, with yourself. Like...a road trip for example. Hours on top of hours spent doing nothing but driving and having total control of the seat warmers, the radio stations, the kind of candy you buy at the gas stations, and if one random road in some mountain town looks intriguing enou
gh to drive down, you go for it.
The question, by default, asked at the end of the trip is always..." So how was the drive?". In stark contrast to the trip North, where I had made plans for myself and the people around me while thinking taking care of my Father was going 
to be a far easier job than I let myself believe. There were less pictures on this trip, more meandering. Found myself, in a fog, literally in the mountains in Virginia, drove through a town that had been devastated by a recent tornado, and drove through Johnson City, Tennessee JUST so I could play Old Crow Medicine Show's song Wagon Wheel and blast it through the streets. I visited friends and family for only hours at a time...I was ready to go home.
You cannot imagine what you are walking into if you do not allow yourself to explore all dimensions of possibility. No where in the forefront of my mind did I actually allow myself to believe he was going to die; maybe that was the best defense mechanism I could conjure. That was how I could help everyone else get through this. All the while deflecting the truth I already knew. But, no. This was unfathomable to me as I traced the coastline with my camera lens and nomadic heart heading North. Headed home.
And in the quickest of moments, I was there. Three months past, vacillating between the feeling of being home for 5 years and 5 days. There was no presence of time. It all stood still, the world stopped spinning. There are things, even now I must be reminded of because I somehow blocked them out; stored in a safety deposit box with no key. The ideas and plans I had for myself and my family quickly disintegrated to wishful thoughts. Never a more sobering experience than this one. The inexplicable realization of the truth had never come at the hand of such a cruelty, taken is the man we love so much. And sooner than we anticipated. Then, it was time to drive home....again.
The roads back to Charleston were laced with a palpable uncertainty. There was little I could do to cease the relentless thoughts that I knew what I was going home to. I d
id not know anymore. The world felt off kilter, slower and a tad gray as I drove out of my home state. I felt lost, even with my trusty tools allowing my safe arrival home. I wondered where my grief would ma
nifest itself. What form would it take? Would I cling to the plaid t-shirt of his that I packed along with me, would I deflect and run into the arms of someone who knew nothing about me? W
ould I squeeze out every ounce of love I held fo
r myself? Where would this grief go?
I think even the subconscious is surprised by the resilience of the heart. Its boundaries are vast and blurred by one's capacity for love. And as much room was left for grief there was double that amount for the love. I took home the hearts of every.singl
e.person who knew him
, thought of him, loved him, and wanted us all to be alright. I carried home my sister, my stepmother, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, friends; they were with me, they paved the Rhode. It was impossible to leave without them....
And so, the title, The Rhode Home, signifies what I left with. I brought a piece of Rhode Island
back with me. The kind of security I needed to know I was not alone.
Since my return, I have found myself cradled by the ocean's tide. I am rocked slowly into a state of mind that makes him real still. Where I hear the faint sounds of John Coltrane dancing with the waves and his voice humming an unknown tune, we walk the beach together, always. This is where I find him, searching for beach glass. I am most at home by the sea. Next to him. And as long as the beach has the sea, he will never leave.
Welcome home.
Thank you Val, Liz, Erik, and Marea for your hours of love and patience with a vagabond friend. And thank you Mom, Papa, Syd, Vito, Justin, Janna, and Kevin for the necessary laughter on a night I needed it most...
And there are not enough words in the dictionary for the love I have for Carla, my amazingly beautiful and wise Stepmother. Who has single-handedly changed my life in 3 months time. I love you so much.
Erica, my unwaveringly strong sister, Never in any stretch of the imagination could I have made it through this without you. You are the truest testament for what it means to be strong and carry the weight of a life unable to be paused as mine was, and still persevere and still be able to find love. You are deserving of everything you have ever asked for and more. I love you bigger than the sky and miss you more than I will ever be able to describe. Thank you for being there for me.
...and yes I took that shirt you were looking for. Sorry. hehe.
